Universal Acess in Human Computer Interaction. Coping with Diversity

In this paper authors review several fundamental issues necessary for the design of inclusive human-computer interaction systems. The main objective is to vindicate the adoption of the Universal Accessibility paradigm in the design of main stream applications. Given that the authors think that current technology and design methods and tools are mature enough for inclusive design, they studied the conditions for its full deployment and propose the elimination of the found obstacles. In this paper, after justifying the importance of the Design for All, the main restrictions to inclusive design are reviewed and the need for a user oriented approach is showed. Other crucial matters to ensure inclusive design, such as user full participation and ethical and social impact avoidance, are analyzed. To finish, the role of the Assistive technology, in relation to Design for All is discussed.

Since the European Commision’s Information Society Technologies Program Advisory Group (ISTAG) coined the phrase “ambient intelligence” [1], [2] a much anticipated future has been considered. That future would involve people with disabilities living in a world populated by interconnected networks of intelligent devices, providing the means for communication, information retrieval, entertainment. A responsibility now exists to include people with disabilities in the debate and discussion of what such a future will mean to them, how it will improve their quality of life and how the potential of future technologies can be appropriately exploited. This paper outlines a collaborative process undertaken by the Central Remedial Clinic, providing a total of 34 people with different disabilities with an opportunity to reflect on and discuss the ISTAG scenarios and envision their own future as citizens with disabilities in a world surrounded by and supported by, as yet unrealised, ambient intelligences.

Self-service technology use and adoption can be seen as an evolutionary process. From a conceptual perspective, evolution delivers the growing advantages of self-service. From a practical perspective, evolution is based on user perceptions and attitude toward adopting the technology. Based on the latter perspective of technology adoption, this paper presents an analysis of three empirical studies exploring self-service solutions for Chinese customers. These studies involve several user-centred research methodologies. The studies were carried out as a result of research collaboration between Sino-European Usability Centre (SEUC), Dalian Maritime University, China and Advanced Technology and Research (AT&R), NCR, U.K. The first study investigates the introduction of a basic automated teller machine (ATM) accommodating Chinese user requirement. Findings indicate that the relationship between individuals’ pre-adoption and post-adoption perceptions of ATMs was a critical determinant of its continued use. The second study focussed on the functionality of ATMs in terms of using cash deposit solution. The study reports that the successful use of cash deposit was evaluated on the basis of users’ understanding of deposit solution. The third study addressed biometric technology use for enhanced security on ATMs. Consistent with previous findings, user perceptions emerged as an important determinant of biometric technology adoption in the Chinese financial market. Based on user perceptions, these studies provide an understanding into the self-service future in China. Several user-centred design guidelines to adapt self-service technology to Chinese user requirements have emerged. Also, these studies offer valuable outcomes in terms of useful insights into the current Chinese banking culture. These insights provide Chinese financial institutions a basis to strategically introduce self-service technology on a broad scale.

Access to information remains a major challenge for people with disabilities. In this paper, an approximate model of how people access information is proposed. This model is presented in the context of the sequence of goals that must be completed by a user to access an information source. This model has led to the development of a tool, the Accessibility Information Matrix that can be used to guide the design of technologies and techniques for information access.

This paper will look at the Challenge Workshop, a knowledge transfer model on the inclusive design process based on the seven DBA Inclusive Design Challenges organised at the Royal College of Art (RCA) since 2000 by the author in collaboration with the Design Business Association, the leading trade association for designers in the UK. This mentored annual competition sees leading UK design firms work with consumers with severe disabilities to develop innovative, inclusive and aspirational product and service prototypes for the mainstream market. It will focus on how this collaborative model has been further developed into creative workshops of varying lengths and iterations in different contexts in the UK, Japan, Israel and Singapore to inspire and inform designers, engineers and others of the innovative possibili-ties of inclusive design and in the process change their perceptions. The paper will also describe how the workshop has been adapted to and addressed the different knowledge transfer challenges of each cultural context and will show examples of some of the outstanding design proposals that have emerged.

The paper presents a meta-design approach to the design and development of interactive systems, which bridges the communication gaps arising among the members of an interdisciplinary design team including different experts: software engineers, human-computer interaction experts, end users as domain experts. Each experts is a stakeholder that proposes design solutions from her/his perspective. The approach, which relies on a novel model of Interaction and Co-Evolution processes, also supports co-evolution of users and systems.

This paper explores the challenges of running large scale international usability tests and attempts to provide useful information on how to effectively and efficiently design and administer these types of projects. The information in this paper is based on the experience of the three authors, who have all been involved in a number of large-scale international usability tests as managers of the projects, designers of the tests and as practitioners responsible for the collection, reduction, and analysis of user data. Practical advice is provided on how to best approach the many challenges of running these types of projects.

The theory and practice of Universal Design have evolved over the last twenty years. Based on a review of relevant publications in design, ergonomics and Human-Computer Interaction, the author summaries the evolution in terms of two shifting paradigms: one is from the separation of the ’Assistive Technology Approach’ (top-down) and the ’Idealistic Universal Design Approach’ (bottom-up) to the integration of the two approaches; the other is from adopting discipline-specific research approaches to collaboration in multidisciplinary research teams. Because of the close relationship between Universal Design and Human Factors and Ergonomics, the challenges of future development of Universal Design are also discussed with regard to the revolution and shifting paradigms in Human Factors and Ergonomics.

User research always presents challenges of interpretation, but these challenges are much greater when the research is done internationally. This is true regardless of whether the research is carried out in one country other than the researcher’s own, or in multiple countries. In this paper, we discuss a number of these challenges, and to offer some practical ways to minimize them.

We discuss the privacy issues related to the design of systems that dis close information about emotions to remote acquaintances, without simulta neous communication: users do not chat, see or hear each other. We consider the acquisition of information, storage, processing, multi-modal rendering, and interactions. We illustrate our points with the system we designed for affec tive bonding and support with family and friends. Our most significant contri bution is the provision of a first overview of the whole process for everyday life uses.

Much of the international focus at companies tends to be on localization. Localization is critical to helping a company be a player in international markets, but strategic user research can play a significant role in driving the company’s international strategy, identifying and defining key opportunities. The methods used in strategic research also need to go beyond localization in order to realize their full potential. Properly ”culturalized” research efforts can help a company reach beyond localization in several ways. This paper will explore how Adobe Systems has engaged in research to extend its offerings in geographies outside of the United States, and in particular it will draw from examples of activities and solutions for the Japanese market.

In this paper, the concerns of inclusivity with respect to technology are with the fragmenting effects upon our interaction and social practices of transferring and transforming knowledge when we use technology as part of our communication and decision-making processes. Through identifying and analysing these effects and the issues they raise for design and use of technology, the paper develops some basic principles of human-centred systems deemed essential for designing for inclusivity.

We have developed a meta-model for Business applications. To generate applications using this meta-model we created a

C

omponent

B

ased

E

Business

A

pplication

D

evelopment and

D

eployment

S

hell; CBEADS

©

.The meta-model we created was based on three abstraction levels: Shell, Applications and Functions. The Shell provides the functionality common to any Web-based Business Application, and a set of configurable components and tools to create functions that are specific to an application. By using CBEADS

©

we can rapidly develop Web-based Business Applications by creating instances of the meta-model based on the Meta Design Paradigm. The key aspect that underpinned this research work was the viewpoint that “software is a medium to capture knowledge rather than a product”. The developer’s knowledge is embedded into the shell and the tools. The End-user’s knowledge is used to populate instances of the meta-model from which applications are generated within CBEADS

©

.

Although information about users is vitally important in inclusive design, its use is often limited. The literature suggests that this is, at least in part, due to the ways in which the information is provided, which do not always match designers’ needs. We therefore conducted a study to discover the information formats that designers do and do not like and use. In this paper, we draw implications for the presentation of design information, suggesting that it should be quick and easy to find and use, visual and stimulating, flexible and open-ended, and relate clearly and concretely to design issues. We also propose two categorisations of information formats and types and discuss the suitability of some specific examples of types of user information.

Numerous methods have been developed to help designers to understand and consider the needs and desires of end-users, but many have had limited uptake in design practice. In order to understand why this is and to enable the development of more effective methods and tools, it is important to uncover how designers themselves think about and react to these methods. We are therefore currently conducting a card-sorting study with designers. We aim to uncover their perceptions of underlying similarities and relationships between design methods, and relate them to the frequency and enjoyment of use. This paper presents results from an initial sample of six designers. A cluster analysis identified a very strong clustering in these results, indicating that common underlying views about methods do exist. Six key clusters are identified, including two focused on user involvement and one on understanding users without direct user contact. The effect of different method characteristics on the frequency and enjoyment of method use are also considered. Initial results indicate that certain clusters of methods are used more often, as are methods that are informal and cheap.

Young people growing up with increasing social noises face the risk of hearing damage because of their long term exposure to loud music. Few hearing protection products on the market were designed for this young market. The challenge was to design earplugs that appeal to 18-30 year olds with a focus on desirability. Using personas and scenarios as tools, design students at Brunel University developed a range of creative concepts for aesthetically pleasing earplugs. The project illustrates that by focusing on desirability and key issues of universal access (i.e. diversity of users, tasks and contexts), a medical type of product could become as popular as fashion accessories, thus appealing to the mass market.

The use of mobile technologies for self services, and the inclusion of elderly and cognitively disabled users in the self-service society can be improved by the application of appropriate ac cessi bility guide lines for mobile de vices. We show how to operationalize the principles of uni versal design, and how to realize these principles on mobile de vices. Ten categories of ac cessi bility guide lines are presented, and accessible user interfaces for an electronic service on a mo bile phone are demonstrated.

The product development in service science will become important for manufacturing industry. Therefore, the introduction of the "service science" concept is necessary in product development. This paper proposes a design improvement method based on HCD (Human Centered Design) concept, which can be introduced to middle/small enterprises, with the structured product concept. A case study of the operation panel design of home security system is discussed in this paper. This method is effective not only in making new products but also in improving developed products. Making a structured product concept is also effective to get consensus among the developers.

Scenario-Based Design has been implemented widely to the concept and product development processes. Especially in the development of Information and Communication Technologies the Scenario-Based Design approach has been utilized widely though with different variations and modifications. In this paper I focus on experiences how Scenario-Based Design approach has enhanced better user experience of design and increased user involvement and user-driven innovation in product development processes.

With the fast economic development in emerging markets, Hewlett-Packard (HP) has to focus on satisfying the needs of customer in these markets. However, due to cross-cultural differences, HP can not automatically assume that products designed in the USA can satisfy customers in those markets. For this reason, HP wants to set up UCD teams to help design products for those markets. Setting up a UCD team in China is the first step of this plan. In this article, through a case study, we want to share what we have gained in past work, what lessons we have learned in practice, and what our next steps will be.

This paper is intended to observe what factors would be most effective for motivating the use of a new function. We named the factors that motivate the use of such function "Kickers". We took up GUI of a music player, and clarified the evaluation structure, in which users might want to start using, by using the Evaluation Grid. We also had the developers make evaluation, and compared the results with those of users. As a result, it was made clear that the early step of using the function is motivated by the operation of an emotional factor of becoming <interested> in the function and of a factor concerning easiness to <understand> it. This result was verified by conducting a quantitative questionnaire survey.

After observing children playing games, two design-engineering students designed a new concept for an interactive playground, the

dot

°. Its basic idea is to shift the computer screen onto the floor. In order to design optimal interfaces (hardware) and game scenarios (software) for everyone to enjoy, the

dot

°

team

decided to adopt an inclusive design process. This paper starts with a discussion of popularism in design, which critiques the conventional welfare designers’ approach to treat ’users’ as study subjects. From the design of the design workshops to the final design solution, this paper presents how a group of young design students worked with a design researcher to formulate their first user-involvement design experience in such a way that all participants in the process could engage in the inclusive experience of exchanging knowledge between designers and users. Finally, the paper documents the user-involvement process from the perspectives of different collaborators, including design students, design researcher, high school students and their school education consultant. Hence, this paper aims to advocate the relevance of designing with people rather for them.

The design of ICT products is at present optimized for mass manufacturing in a global scale. Yet local communities and specific users have needs that are in danger of being excluded from the benefits of new technology. We present our experience of co-designing targeted products with local stakeholders embedded in their concrete social and material context and everyday practices. Our claim is such embedded design could be achieved through combining modular global technology with local handcrafts, which contain shared cultural meanings and guaranteed affordance.

Universal design is an approach to design daily used products that are usable by all people to the greatest possible extent. However, successful application of universal design requires an understanding of human performance. Ergonomic considerations are a part of "universal design" and should be taken into account by manufacturing engineers in product development. Integration of ergonomic considerations into the manufacturing processes becomes a major marketing strategy. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is intended to explore the relationship between body dimensions and the “height” of consumer products. A “user/product/effect” model is proposed to study how to design “height” into products and the results are discussed.

The data formats of specialist disciplines are often difficult for those from other disciplines to access, not least lay audiences, inhibiting truly participative and inclusive processes. The authors discuss the achievements and value of visualizing biomechanical data on functional demand obtained during daily activities from older adults in the 60+, 70+ and 80+ age groups which has shown the potential to provide physiotherapists, occupational therapists, designers, bioengineers, and human factors specialists much improved access to the data. Older adults have their own valuable insights and these are vital to include in developing a fuller understanding of issues that affect their quality of life. The format of visualization has the potential to be understood by this ’lay’ audience. The paper discusses the design of, and pilots towards a full-scale study to try to fully engage stakeholder disciplines and older people as truly collaborative partners, together with conclusions to date.

The uptake of Universal Design (UD) by manufacturing industries in Japan has been a recent and extensive phenomenon. The sector has identified the significant market opportunities brought about by the rapidly changing needs and lifestyle aspirations of its ageing society. In this review, the author discusses innovation in products, specifically mobile phones, developed through a UD philosophy, within the context of Japanese manufacturing corporate culture and the wider national goal for a socially integrated environment. Corporate literature and product marketing material are also referenced as a means of revealing the relationship between company and customer. The author asks what value can be obtained from understanding the factors stimulating and supporting this phenomenon and if this UD approach in Japan can be translated outwith its unique corporate and national cultures for further applications elsewhere.

Search string analysis has implications for developing better designs of Web interfaces and search engines. It is expected that millions of new users from Africa will enter the Internet arena in the not so distant future. Most of these users will be from countries with a low socio-economic standing. In order to determine the effect of socio-economic standing on the search behaviour of grade ten learners, their search characteristics were analysed. This study found that there is a difference in the search behaviour between novice users with a low socio-economic standing and those with a high socio-economic standing. These differences, however, only lasted for the first few sessions, where after all users showed the same search behaviour.

In recent years, a growing number of projects seek to address the disparity in opportunities available to people in rural versus urban areas through

Information and Communication Technologies.

When introducing such technologies, there are a number of recognised barriers to their use and acceptance specific to rural areas. We define an ’inclusive technology’ as a technology which overcomes the barriers in using technology that are inherent within a community in order to increase the available opportunities. We propose a conceptual model and a set of heuristic measurements for evaluating the ’inclusiveness’ of a technology with respect to a given community, and illustrate our model by applying it to an actual real-world project. With this model we hope to achieve a better understanding of the problem, and develop a systematic process and framework for designing and evaluating technologies designed to overcome these disparities.

“Universal Access” is often focused on modifying main-stream products to respond to the demands of older and disabled people – which implies an extremely wide range of user characteristics. “Accessible” system design can produce systems which may be “accessible” but are in no sense “usable”. Many system developers also seem to believe that a consideration of older and disabled people mean the abandonment of exciting and beautiful designs.In contrast, we recommend driving inclusive design from the margins not the centre, and that designers should consider a number of “extra-ordinary users” in depth as individual people, rather than as representatives of an age group and/or disability, and design for their desires, and tastes as well as their needs. This provides a reasonable design brief, and the consideration of extremes acts as an effective provocation within the design process. A number of case studies will illustrate the effectiveness of this approach. Ways in which communication with extreme users can be most effectively conducted are also described.

Augmented Cognition is distinct from other disciplines due to its focus on using modern neuroscientific tools to determine the ’in real time’ cognitive state of an individual and then adapting the human-system interaction to meet a user’s information processing needs based on this real-time assessment [1], [7], [14]. Augmented Cognition systems employ the use of physiologicaland neurophysiological-driven adaptive automation techniques to mitigate the effects of bottlenecks (e.g., attention, working memory, executive function) and biases in cognition. Being able to non-invasively measure and assess a humansystem computing operator’s cognitive state in real time and use adaptive automation (mitigation) techniques to modify and enhance their IP capabilities in any application context is a goal that could substantially improve human performance and the way people interact with 21

st

Century technology [9]. This paper highlights developments in the field of Augmented Cognition most relevant to future Universal Access (UA) applications.

Several evaluations of team awareness systems showed, that interruptions and privacy violations during usage often lead to the rejection of the system by users. Most authors argue that this rejection is due to a fundamental dual trade-off between sending awareness information and privacy, and between receiving awareness information and disruption or resource consumption. While the assumption of a fundamental trade-off is widely accepted in state-of-the-art research, this paper disputes the predominant hypothesis. Instead, it is argued, that the trade-off is not of fundamental nature, but caused by neglecting elementary aspects in the design process. In order to verify this line of argument, a novel interface concept for mediating socio-emotional awareness information is presented. To verify the validity of the conceptual approach, several evaluations were conducted. The evaluations verified the approach of this paper and showed, that a cautious interface design can enhance user privacy in multi-user awareness systems and minimize disruptive effects on primary tasks, without reducing awareness mediation and usability.

The current development of the Internet and its growing use makes it necessary to satisfy the needs of all users including those with disabilities having accessibility problems. Therefore we developed a new validator software called XValid, which is a human controlled testing tool for specific needs in light of design for all. We used the well-known WebXACT and this newly developed XValid validator for testing governmental, commercial and e-learning web pages. We made a comparison between both testing results. Based on these results we want to open web-designer’s eyes to the typical errors.

The purpose of this paper is to clearly point out commonly agreed definitions of the terms Ergonomics, Usability, Accessibility and Safety, their relations to each other, overlaps and differences and their influence on the design of products and services.

Traditionally assistive technology or environmental intervention introduced to help with independence in the home has tended to look ‘medical’ or ‘institutional’, focussing on function rather than aesthetic considerations and overlooking the aspirations of the householder. This paper describes a recent social housing project where the interior design of two newly built houses in Bradford, UK, for Habinteg Housing Association, were used to demonstrate that it is possible to balance form and function when designing to enhance independence in the home. The Bradford project builds on previous research in this area by the author and refers to the paper ‘Home Improvement for Independent Living’ (Pearce 2003). The initial research was in turn inspired by the construction of the first Lifetime Homes in Hull in 1994 by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, in collaboration with Habinteg Housing Association.

Participative software systems are a new class of software systems whose development does not end at the deployment but requires continued user participation and contribution. They need to provide both solutions to users and a participation framework that entails technical and social challenges. Meta-design is a promising approach to guide the development of participative software systems. Drawing on lessons learned from a systematic analysis of Open Source Software projects, this paper described general issues that need to be addressed to enable and encourage continued user participation during the meta-design process.

This paper presents a walkthrough evaluation method for assessing, in a Universal Access perspective, interactive systems. The methodology is an adaptation of the traditional cognitive walkthrough used for many years in the usability engineering community. Cognitive walkthrough involves a simulation of the

problem-solving process

of an

average user

, to ensure that the user can easily learn to perform tasks that the system is indented to support. The proposed method, described here in brief along with the underlying theoretical framework, extends this approach by: (a) involving a simulation of the users’ reasoned action process, to ensure that users will be in favour of accessing, exploring, utilising, and, ultimately, adopting the system; (b) addressing the diverse needs of all users, rather than of the average user, thus incorporating accessibility for all target users as an intrinsic measurement. A set of printed forms with specific questions reflecting the proposed methodology has been developed to guide the new walkthrough procedure. Early experiences with the application of the method in the domain of eServices are also discussed.

Context-awareness is an important capability needed in devices in a ubiquitous computing environment. Ubiquitous computing devices use different types of sensors along with the user’s interaction history in order to collect and store data. This data is then used to adapt the user’s behavior to suit the current environment. In addition to the explicit modifications by user control, the behavior of these computing devices along with the interaction amongst one another depends on the continuously changing environment conditions. These characteristics require the development of systems that have both, adaptive and an adaptable nature. Context-awareness is particularly important for physically handicapped people. This is due to the fact that context-aware ubiquitous devices are able to help them detect changes in the surrounding, which handicapped people can not do for themselves. In this research paper we suggest a general architecture of Context-Aware Adaptable System (CAAS). We exemplify this architecture with an Ambient Service prototype that we have developed.

In recent years, projectors are undergoing a transformation as they evolve from static output devices to portable, or communication systems. However, the projection images appear distorted unless the projector is precisely aligned to the projection screen. Generally many projection-based systems are corrected for oblique projection distortion using calibration methods (e.g., warping function). Computing a warping function uses fiducials or a special pattern projected to the screen. These methods are unable to automatically calibrate in real-time especially when a projector is moving. In this paper, we proposed an automatic calibration system in real-time. Our system makes up of a function to correct images that are only based on the degree angle of a mirror set up in front of the projector without attaching fiducials to the screen. Therefore the system can be used to display regardless of screen condition in parallelepiped room. This operation process is very simple and fast. Therefore our system provides a function of correcting movies during the movement of the projector (27.3fps). An advantage of the proposed method is the system can be easily applied to ubiquitous computing like interactive presentation or game.

There is a consensus on the significance and high contribution of user involvement in the process of user interfaces development. However, there is no standard way to implement user involvement in software development processes. Dealing with speech-based interfaces that involve vocal interaction of speaking and hearing, the need of user involvement is increased. In this paper, we focus on the characteristics of speech interface development and suggest a user-based method that enables continuous user evaluation. We illustrate the method implementation in two different software projects that contain speech interfaces.

This paper describes an approach to use virtual reality technology and motion capturing for the immersive teaching of virtual humans. A combination of direct and indirect interaction as well as 2D list style menus and 3D dialogs has been realized to simplify the teaching process. In contrast to existing desktop solutions the presented concept allows even inexperienced users to reasonable work with the system. The interaction principles support an iterative work flow which speeds up the ergonomic evaluation and improvement of industrial work places remarkable.

This paper presents guidelines for the design of self-administered surveys for visually impaired and blind people within a mixed mode approach. The different needs of the target group are fulfilled by offering different modes of participation (paper-based, braille-based, Web-based). Reading aids have in common that they enhance the focus of a specific piece of text or single word. This advantage turns into a disadvantage in terms of a clear overview and arrangement of the text elements on a page. Therefore text needs to be designed with cognitive processes and accessibility standards in mind. This is especially true for a survey questionnaire where each question and answer item has to convey its own special meaning independent from context. Design problems and their solutions are described and illustrated with experiences from pretesting and a case study.

The Tile Dreamer is an integrated tool for creating and managing tiles, being two dimensional recurring constituent components of commonly deployed in structuring tile-based game terrains. The application consists of four basic subsystems: (a) the main tile editor for constructing tiles; (b) the bitmap ripper, automatically computing the least number of tiles for any given bitmap; (c) the connectivity checker, to test how tiles actually fit together to form larger regions; and (d) the tile bitmap builder, to put together a final set of tiles as a single bitmap. We discuss how the design of game tiles through the Tile Dreamer tool becomes easier and more efficient.

Lab Usability Tests show a series of inherent shortcomings that are attributable in essence to the artificial lab situation. This article informs about the reasons for developing a specific Remote Testing approach and describes how this measure helps to avoid such deficits. Subsequently, we will introduce the approach as well as two evaluation studies that assess the result quality of a Remote and a Lab Test within the context of online shopping.

For inter-sensor broadcast authentication in wireless sensor networks, Chen

et al

. proposed a bootstrapping scheme which enables to save only neighboring nodes’ hash-chain commitments, much fewer than whole network size, before deployment [2]. However, the scheme lacks scalability and is not tolerant for node isolation. Therefore, we suggest new mechanism providing scalability and present its modified version with node-redemption which makes most of nodes participate in broadcast authentication with a little additional memory.

Web accessibility is becoming a prominent issue in several countries, not only because of legal and compliance issues, but because of sound commercial opportunities arising in an ageing society and the Mobile Web. This paper will present recent developments under the umbrella of the BenToWeb project to create new advanced compliance modules to check automatically accessibility issues were before human intervention was necessary. These modules will be integrated in an existing Web Compliance Framework named imergo®.

User authentication is necessary for proving and verifying the claimed identity of users in a distributed environment. Three factors such as user’s knowledge, belongings, and biometric traits are usually considered for the purpose. A sort of multi-factor authentication may combine those factors in the way that a user provides the requested multi-factors separately, for improving the accuracy and security of authentication. However, such a combination of distinct factors should require each different human-computer interfaces. In this short paper, rather we introduce our on-going work to associate knowledge-based authentication with biometrics for requiring less interfaces and examine the benefits expected from it in a conceptual level.

Traditionally, evaluations for accessibility have been user-centered, based on guidelines and standards that are also user-centered. An argument is made for putting the needs of developers and programmers at the center of any accessibility evaluation process. Current practice in industry is briefly considered, including the roles of accessibility consultants as well as people in accessibility program offices in large companies. Their interactions with website and software application developers in the product development context is described. A project aimed at understanding developers as ’users’ of universal access guidance is introduced. This project focuses on the decisions that people involved with software programming and website development make with regards to disability access issues. The rationale and methodology for the project are introduced, and a three-stage process looking at past and current events; interview studies of consultants and product developers; and observational studies of decision making with respect to universal access.

Existing biometric authentication systems use probabilistic method to decide the claimed identity of a user. But, these are weak on the privacy protection perspective as anyone can access someone’s biometric template without restrictions. Therefore, we propose a scheme that can improve the biometric authentication accuracy with the concept of digital signature with biometric digital key. By using these biometric digital key pairs, each entity(sender) can mutually authenticate the others based on the biometric certificate on open network.

This study is on developing methodology of accessibility and usability for the auditory disabled by producing the interface of converting auditory elements into visual elements that are extracted from elements of the artistic representational method of contemporary media art, and by building on-line community for the auditory disabled to enhance and to reflect the accessibility and the usability through the group’s own development and design. At the first stage, analyses on current web animations and their accessibility of auditory disabled persons. At the second stage, analyses on contemporary media artworks are followed to extract usable elements from the artwork. At this stage, actual image captions are created. At the third stage, the image caption generating software is developed, and adjusted image captions are produced as the content. At the last stage, the linkage of web and on-line user community is set up. The development can improve accessibility of the auditory disabled using a various digital content, and it magnifies the territory for the application and the production of creative interfaces. It can also expand the area of content technology.

Issue of the computer software quality has an interdisciplinary nature and it is a subject of research in numerous scientific disciplines, including the software engineering, economics, psychology and ergonomics. Considerations concerning the integration of the subjective factors with the technical parameters in respect of the computer software quality testing are not present in the literature. Therefore, this Article comprised the results of research on the software quality assessments made by users. This Article includes four parts, which represent: the research methods, the economic conditions connected with the computer software quality assessment, the social conditions and the Summary. The first part of the Article discusses the method of correspondence as well as the typology of the economic and social working conditions that were used to create the correlation model for the computer software assessment. In the second part of the Article the authors discussed the economic conditions for computer software assessment that were qualified to one of the three groups: variables that describe: organizational and technical situation, self assessment of the employee’s position in the company and the evaluation of the employment security. Further part of this Article is dedicated to correlation between the social issues and the computer software quality assessment. The four variables: sight affections, monotony of work, work intensiveness as well as the psychophysical affections were classified under a single group titled Employee Health Hazards. This Article is concluded with Summary, where the authors indicated the essentiality of economic and social issues in the computer software quality assessment.

Within the eEurope2010 initiative “An Information Society for All”, development methods which enable the inclusion of the end-user become essential in order to ensure the paradigm of Universal Access. It is important to understand the end-users, their behavior, their knowledge of technology and their abilities and the context in which the applications will be used. In this paper, we combine our experiences in both Agile Methods and Usability Engineering and show that the resulting agile usability methods – however these maybe designated – are ideally suited to design and develop applications which follow the idea of Universal Access and where the end-user is having great influence on systems design.

There are tremendous need increase for personal verification and identification in internet security, electronic commerce and access control in recent years. Also, as the demands for security in many applications such as data protection and financial transaction become an increasingly relevant issues, the importance of biometric technology is rapidly increasing. In this paper, we explored face recognition system for person authentication. We explicitly state the design decisions by introducing a generic modular PCA face recognition system. We designed implementations of each module, and evaluate the performance variations based on virtual galleries and probe sets. We perform experiments and report results using equal error rates (EER) based on verification scenario for access control applications.

In this paper we developed driver authentication system based on face recognition. Since 2D based face recognition has been shown its structural limitation, 3D model based approach for face recognition has been spotlighted as a robust solution under variant conditions of pose and illumination. Since a generative 3D face model consists of a large number of vertices, a 3D model based face recognition system is generally inefficient in computation time. In this paper, we propose a novel 3D face representation algorithm to reduce the number of vertices and optimize its computation time. Finally, we evaluate the performance of proposed algorithm with the Korean face database collected using a stereo-camera based 3D face capturing device. In addition, various decision making similarity measures were explored for final results. Our experimental results indicated that the algorithm is robust for driver authentication inside the vehicle and is also reasonably fast for real-time processing.

In this paper, we propose a graphics adaptation framework with a mechanism of video streaming to overcome the shortcoming of real-time representation and interaction experiences of 3D graphics application running on mobile devices. We therefore develop an interactive 3D visualization system based on the proposed framework for rapidly representing a complex 3D scene on mobile devices without having to download it from the server. Our system scenario is composed of a client viewer and an adaptive media streaming server. The client viewer offers the user to navigate the 3D scene and interact with objects of interests for studying about them through the responded text descriptions. The server adaptively provides media contents to the client according to the user preferences, interactions, and the condition of wireless network.

Ari Juel et al from ISIT 2002 presented a fuzzy vault scheme, which is a framework to encrypt a cryptographic key with a fuzzy key[5]. Following their framework, many trials to implement mainly a fuzzy finger vault have been proposed that enables us to keep secretly a key with our finger print. Our work is to focus on instantiating the fuzzy information of the fuzzy vault scheme with human faces instead of fingers. Most of face authentication algorithms are dependent upon weighted features, which are incompatible with the original fuzzy vault scheme. To reflect the level of importance of individual features from feature set, we introduce another layer between captured feature set and points in the polynomial to be interpolated.

While software developers for desktop applications can rely on mouse and keyboard as standard input devices, developers of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) applications usually have to deal with a large variety of individual interaction devices. Existing device abstraction layers provide a solution to this problem, but are usually limited to a specific set or type of input devices. In this paper we introduce DEVAL – an approach to a device abstraction layer for VR and AR applications. DEVAL is based on a device hierarchy that is not limited to input devices, but naturally extends to output devices.

Guidelines and standards are gaining increasing importance world-wide. However, their process of development is still in a state of flux. The same stands regarding the means for spreading, retrieving and utilising such knowledge. A portal-based approach is proposed here for supporting all lifecycle phases of guidelines and standards. The proposed approach has significant advantages: (a) it allows contributors from all over the globe to form working groups, share virtual working spaces and, thereby, collaborate for the development of guidelines and standards; (b) it facilitates the rapidly spread and effective use of produced knowledge; and (c) it tackles the demand-supply gap by bridging developers and consumers of knowledge.

The paper describes an approach to specifically tailored user interface design, to adapt the user interface to the specific needs of mobility impaired travellers. Given a user has some interaction impairments or s/he is in a situation that causes an interaction impairment (i.e. noisy environment has the same consequences as hearing impairment), another modality is to be used or adapted to compensate this impairment. As sound has other interaction characteristics than graphical user interface elements (e.g. information can not be presented in parallel, but sequentially), rules for substituting some modalities through others are described.

This study presents a model to design and implement mobile applications to support the displacement and dynamic decision making of users with visual disabilities. To identify the real added value of using mobile technologies as support aids for decision making in dynamic contexts for users with visual disabilities, we provide an application case. By using a graph to represent the computer model of a real school for blind children, for whom a system was already developed using our model, we provide a real example application of this model. This provided enough input to enrich, improve and redesign the model; ending up with a usable mobile application model to assist the mobility and orientation of blind users.

GUI builder tools are widely used in practice to develop the user interface of software systems. Typically they are visual programming tools that support direct-manipulative assembling of the user interface components. We have developed the tool GuiBuilder which follows a model-driven approach to the development of graphical (multimedia) user interfaces. This allows a meta-design approach where user interface developers as well as prospective users of the system are supported in modelling the desired functionality of the GUI on a high level of abstraction that is easy to understand for all involved stakeholders. The model consists of compositional presentation diagrams to model the structure of the user interface and hierarchical statechart diagrams to model its behaviour. GuiBuilder then supports the transformation of the model to Java, i.e., the generation of a working user interface and the simulation of the modelled behaviour. Interactive sessions with the user interface can be recorded and replayed.

The “NateOn” messenger is the most popular messenger in Korea (It has 17,160,000 users in Korea). In this paper, we will analyze the security of authentication mechanism of the NateOn. We will show that the “NateOn Ver 3.5.15.0(600)” is very vulnerable to the replay attack and the dictionary attack. Furthermore, we will show that other messengers such as “BuddyBuddy Ver 5.8” (It has 5,980,000 users in Korea), “Daum Touch Ver 5.06101300” (It has 2,384,000 users in Korea), etc. have the similar security problems.

The advances in computer and communication technologies increased both the number of users and the amount of data shared over the Network. Many times the amount of complex and articulated information available makes it difficult to retrieve what is really required for a given task. For these reasons, the efficient, easy and trustworthy transfer of data is now of paramount importance in many everyday scenarios, especially concerning environments and situations where security and data protection are mandatory. On the other hand, data protection often implies the adoption of security means which create virtual (and sometimes even physical) barriers to data retrieval. In this paper, advanced identification technologies, based on the processing of biometric data, are presented. These techniques provide a number of tools to facilitate the seamless human interaction with the data, and the security barriers, by enabling the environment to recognize and learn from the user, shaping the data available on the basis of his/her identity. The presented techniques are based on the extraction of invariant features from face and fingerprint images to process static biometric features, also allowing the enhancement of identification accuracy by data fusion.

Among the variety of heuristics evaluation methods available, four paramount approaches have emerged: Nielsen’s ten usability heuristics, Shneiderman’s Eight Golden Rules of Interface Design, Tognazzini’s First Principles of Interaction Design, and a set of principles based on Edward Tufte’s visual display work. To simplify access to a comprehensive set of heuristics, this paper describes an approach to integrate existing approaches (i.e., identify overlap, combine conceptually related heuristics) in a single table hereafter referred to as the Multiple Heuristics Evaluation Table (MHET). This approach also seeks to update these approaches by addressing existing gaps and providing concrete examples that illustrate the application of concepts. Furthermore, the authors identify three decision factors that support meaningful communication among stakeholders (e.g., product managers, engineers) and apply them to the MHET heuristics. Finally, this paper discusses the practical implications and limitations of the MHET.

Current experience shows that vocational context has a vital role to play in research on inclusive information society technology, for at least four reasons. First, the occurrence of disabilities has a major impact on employability and employment. However, the potentially significant contribution of accessible and usable information society technology (IST) in employment has yet to make more than little difference in practice. Context of use is still often ignored. In other words, to ensure that applications can achieve as broad a customer base as possible, they are often designed for generic, rather than specific, cases. While this enables those applications to support a wide variety of use-case scenarios, the corollary is that not as much specific support is afforded to individual use-case scenarios as when designed for a more focused sets of tasks. Second, despite the impressive increases in computing power, innovations in interactive design, such as 3-D user interfaces (UIs), are rarely incorporated into mainstream IST products. One of the fundamental principles taught to most software UI designers is that of ’consistency’, i.e. that similar functions should look the same and behave in similar ways across a variety of applications. The benefit of this approach is that once a user is familiar with the interaction metaphors being used, it will take minimal time to learn to use a new and unfamiliar application. The flipside of this principle, though, is that it can stifle the development of new and innovative UI techniques, because they will not be ’consistent’ with existing applications and UI designs. Greater emphasis upon the context of use in general and the vocational, educational and lifestyle context in particular could lead to better user uptake, as the resultant UI would be better suited to the individual needs ands wants of each particular user. This better uptake, in turn, gives better feedback to mainstream system designers. Third, without context, the identification of user and system characteristics is an unbounded problem. There are simply too many possible different design options to manage easily. The consideration of vocational or recreational context significantly reduces the scale of the problem and renders it more manageable.Fourth, accessibility research in a vocational context ensures that the participants not only gain indirectly from it but benefit directly too, often gaining an improved vocational standing. If so, emerging design methods like unified user interface design (UUID) methods should place much more concentration on the vocational context of use.

There is a growing body of evidence that key components of human cognition can be used to identify important aspects of accessibility design for universal access in the information society, through user modelling. However, there is an equal growth in an appreciation of the contexts within which any interactive system must function, including the vocational and social contexts. If so, there is an important need is to extend cognitive user models to respond to and make predictions about the vocational and social contexts that make up the information society. Whilst many aspects of social intelligence can, it seems, be subsumed under current cognitive architectures of the user, there is the practical danger that the contribution of social intelligence may be underestimated when considered as a subset of the knowledge domains or skills sets of human cognition. To counter this practical development problem, the concept of the social intelligence interface is introduced as a developmental construct to inform the inclusive design process.

In this paper, we present an exploratory study of the web navigation experiences of dyslexic users. Findings indicate that dyslexics exhibit distinctive web navigation behaviour and preferences. We believe that the outcomes of this study add to our understanding of the particular needs of this web user population and have implications for the design of effective navigation structures.

This paper describes a study conducted to develop a set of interface design principles and guidelines that can be used to develop and improve universal access systems for the visually impaired, such as Haptic Audio Virtual Environments (HAVEs). Over the last few decades, user interface systems have advanced to allowing users to interact with computational systems physically, perceptively, and conceptually. However, this process has also left blind and partially blind users unable to access such new technologies. It is also true that there are currently only limited methods for presenting information non-visually and these do not provide an equivalent speed and ease of use to their graphical counterparts. Comprehensible design principles and guidelines addressing the needs of blind users should be helpful when developing universal access systems, such as haptic audio virtual environments that use multiple sensory modalities to present information.

In 1980, World Health Organization defined handicap as a condition of disadvantage. Instead, since 2001, WHO considers handicap as a form of diversity, embedded in a society where anybody is diverse in his/her own way. This change in definition signals a cultural transformation both in the society at large and in its part that is composed by the “handicapped” people. Such a change in the attitudes is rooted in the fact that the assistive technologies let people to overcome limitations and allow to build an intelligent ambient that permits all to exploit their diverse potentialities. In Italy, this process of social change has been accompanied, for more than twenty years, by a Foundation (ASPHI), whose mission has been to favour the education and the inclusion in the labour market of people with disability through the use, at the beginning, of the computer-based, and, then, of the communication technologies. In the following contribution, the main characteristics, and activities, and the evolution processes of ASPHI will be presented, together with the outcomes of a survey on how the process of cultural transformation has taken place. The survey was conducted on a sample of the people that directly (they have attended course in ASPHI) or indirectly (they at least once asked ASPHI for information or help) had to do with 6h9s Foundation. The quantitative and qualitative information show a clear shift in the self-perception of “people with disability” from exclusion to inclusion, from the limitations of the handicap to the value of diversity.

This paper examines the relationship between stigmatic effects of design of technology products for the older and disabled and contextualizes this within wider social themes such as the functional, social, medical and technology models of disability. Inclusive design approaches are identified as unbiased methods for designing for the wider population that may accommodate the needs and desires of people with impairments, therefore reducing ’aesthetic stigma’. Two case studies illustrate stigmatic and nonstigmatic designs.

As many as 10 million people in the United States are diagnosed with a complex neurological movement disorder called Essential Tremor (ET), with many more worldwide [1]. ET is a condition that is particularly troublesome during the use of computer programs that require good mouse control. The purpose of this study was to determine whether hardware and software versions of a smoothing filter labeled the Tremor Control Mouse (TCM) could provide short- and/or long-term benefits for individuals who have difficulty using a computer because of ET of the hands. A paired-samples

t

-test revealed significant differences (

p

<.05) between participants’ responses to ease-of-use questions regarding traditional mouse use compared to TCM use. Subjective responses to survey items on TCM advantages, disadvantages, and helpfulness were very positive overall and reflected the participants’ belief that the TCM was a useful device in enhancing mouse control and, consequently, computer use.

Technical devices and software applications with an increasing number of functions are appearing on the market. With an aging population, there is a growing need to consider less experienced users. Integrating training applications in technical devices is a promising approach to close the knowledge gap of these users. But how should a training application be designed? We developed a training program which teaches the use of a mobile phone in a task oriented manner. Training versions were designed which differ in their degree of interactivity: The learner trained either with an improved paper-based manual or with an interactive e-learning application, which integrates guided exercises in the learning process. These training versions are compared experimentally. Preliminary results show that both groups learned successfully to use a mobile phone.

User-testing is a critical activity in software development. However, eliciting appropriate test-users can be difficult. Recent work showed that (during user-testing of educational software) dyslexic final-year students identified a larger number of subtle (yet significant) issues in more detail than other students. However, final year students were not the target users of the software (designed to teach fundamental programming concepts). This paper presents preliminary results of work replicating the previous study, but with participants from the target user group (first year students). The first year students identified fewer issues and gave less detail than the final year students. The dyslexic students identified more issues in greater detail than the other students. This highlights a distinction between the perceived target user group (first year students) and the actual target user group (students who don’t understand programming concepts). Dyslexia may push people deeper into the actual target user group for educational software.

In the framework of a research target that aims at integration of sign language technologies to human-computer interaction applications, creation and annotation of the Greek Sign Language Corpus (GSLC) involve, on the one hand, data and analysis of the phonological structure of morphemes of Greek Sign Language (GSL) and, on the other hand, collection of sentence level language samples and assignment of their respective annotations. GSLC also entails free sign narrations fully annotated at least for sentence segmentation. Simple and complex sign morpheme formation is directly relevant to development of sign recognition prototypes. In this sense, a sign language corpus intended to support sign recognition by exploitation of a language model has to entail sufficient data from simple- to complex- morpheme level. Sentence level annotation, except for sentence boundaries, focuses on phrase boundary marking and grammar information often conveyed by multi-layer markers, as is the case of e.g. topicalisation, nominal phrase formation, temporal indicators, question formation and sentential negation in GSL.

In an emergency such as an earthquake, it is important to give information in different formats that permit everyone to realize rapid assimilation. In public spaces, information is presented to the hearing impaired in text as well as sign language movies. In this case, it is considered that the readout time and impression of the information depend on the layout of sign language movies and text used. However, there are no comprehensive guidelines on the proper layout of sign language movies and text. This paper focuses on optimizing the layout of text and sign language movies to decrease the readout time of the hearing impaired and the normal hearing. Tests show that the optimal spatial separation between the text and its accompanying sign language movie depends on their relative position. They also indicate that the readout time depends on the separation between the line head of text and the center line of the translator in the sign language movie.

This paper presents the results of ongoing research on methods for evaluating the accessibility conformance level of software and especially operating systems. Our approach is based on recommendations from software accessibility standards, and defines techniques for evaluating each of those recommendations. The proposed method has been applied to evaluate the accessibility features of one closed-source and one open-source desktop operating system, Microsoft Windows XP and the Ubuntu Linux distribution, respectively. Specifically, the functionality we have evaluated was task management and file system management. From the point of view of the evaluation process, we conclude that more work is needed on the development of support tools and techniques. And from the point of view of the specific comparison, we conclude that, taking into account the analysed functionality, the current version of the Ubuntu Linux distribution is slightly more accessible than the current Windows release, though neither of the systems fully conform to the accessibility standards.

This paper presents activities and challenges when implementing information processing technologies for people with hearing and visual impairments. Other than keyboard based input and monitor based for output modalities should be employed for this category of users. More important is that these modalities are crucial element for successful implementation of complex systems designed for disabled people. Some activities carried on in Lithuania implementing applications oriented for disabled people or using speech technologies and targeted to impaired people are presented too.

This paper examines the context of mobile computing within facilities maintenance activities on the basis of an analysis of cursor movement and point and click disruptions that may occur when a number of perturbations are induced by the computing environment. An analysis based on context-aware computing distinguishes between situational induced impairments and disabilities (SIID) whose properties are related to Health Induced Impairments and Disabilities (HIID) such as motion impairment, tremor or spasm. A number of technology solutions based on Assistive Technology interventions for motion impaired cursor movement stabilization are possible approaches to counter SIID in Mobile computing for maintenance environments. A software based cursor movement smoothing method based on statistical state space filtering is presented as an example of a new development of one such approach.

In many respects, cognitive difficulties and learning impairments are the poor relation of Universal Access (UA) research. Research into emotional impairments is even less common. A simple review of almost any general UA or Assistive Technology conference proceedings will typically show a strong bias towards sensory (vision and hearing) impairment, with a strong minority addressing motor impairment issues. This is an improvement on the situation a few years ago where the vast majority of the papers would be based solely on blindness, despite that particularly impairment constituting only 14% of people with a vision impairment and 2% of the overall prevalence of functional impairment in the general population [7]. This paper discusses the reasons why such a disparity exists and summarises the outcome of an International Symposium, hosted by the IBM Human Ability and Accessibility Center, to establish the state-of-the-art in research and best practices for supporting access for users with cognitive difficulties and learning impairments.

During the years 2001–2004 STAKES implemented a national development project VETURI - networking interpreter services -. Its objective was to improve the preconditions for the availability and quality of interpreter services. The starting point for this development work was to provide a service with a sufficiently large population base, in the form of regionally co-ordinated network co-operation of a variety of stakeholders. A part of the service in the project was given as remote videophone service. Remote interpreting made an interpreter’s work easier because she did not need to travel and was able to work from a familiar work location. New ways to produce services enabled the growth of remote interpretation service. Larger population base and service resources made it possible to bring service also there where it has not been earlier.

Accessible design for World Wide Web content has been a significant focus for many years. Guidelines, such as the W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), give designers a list of checkpoints to be used to help ensure that web content will be accessible to users with deficits. Of these deficits, however, far less attention has been paid to designing for users with cognitive deficits. In order to address this, we present an orthogonal set of cognitive ability dimensions based in modern neuroscience, the SCEMA model, which designers may use to characterize an individual user and help better inform accessible design.

Twelve users with a range of ages between 20 and 70, were assessed for their cognitive capabilities and degree of experience with microwave cooker features and then trialled with two microwaves, one with a dials interface and the other with a buttons interface. The users were provided with a set of tasks to complete with each microwave. It was hypothesised that all users would perform better with the dials model but that the difference in performance between dials and buttons would become more pronounced as age increased. This was found to be the case in comparing the performance from the trials, with the strongest correlation occurring between the users age and the time taken to complete the tasks.

Providing large bandwidth of resistant force to trainees is an important requirement of a knee joint rehabilitation robot. Although large resistant force can be achieved by using big motor, difficulty will arise to achieve small resistant force because of the influence of friction, gravity and inertia of the heavy robot. This paper presents a force bandwidth control method based on admittance-control paradigm, which combines theoretical model under active mode and experimental data under passive mode to compensate the influence of the friction, gravity and inertia force upon the torque sensor signal. This method avoids the necessity to establish complex mathematic model of the friction forces. Furthermore, a digital filter method is proposed to reduce computational error of angular acceleration resulted from differentiating encoder values. An optimal filtering parameter range is chosen by Matlab simulation. Experiment results based on a physical prototype prove the enlarged resistant force bandwidth after force compensation.

Color is inaccessible for individuals who are blind or visually impaired, as it is a purely visual feature. Given that many everyday tasks rely on color including coordinating clothing, social interactions, etc., the inaccessibility of color has an adverse effect on daily life. We propose an interactive, wearable assistive device that can recognize and convey colors of scenes or objects. As computer vision is challenging in real world environments due to, e.g., illumination or pose changes, computer vision algorithms can be augmented with sub-systems that can provide information on working environments of a recognition algorithm, and how it affects the recognition accuracy. In this paper, we introduce a framework that incorporates such measures, herein called

confidence measures

, in wearable assistive devices. By communicating to the user a quantitative measure that signifies the difference between optimal working conditions and the real environment working conditions, we can convey the reliability of system-made decisions, which enables the user to take action to improve confidence.Given that color recognition is challenging in real world settings, our system is built within our proposed framework for confidence measures. Finally, we present user recognition accuracies, both with and without confidence measures.

There is an increasing number of rich content that includes audio and presentations. It is important to caption these contents to assure accessibility for hearing impaired persons and seniors. Initially, we conducted a survey and found that the combination of video with audio, captions, and presentation slides (hereafter "multimedia composite") is helpful in understanding the content. Also our investigation shows that the availability of captioning is still very low and therefore there is a strong need for an effective captioning system. Based on this preliminary survey and investigation, we would like to introduce a new method which integrates caption editing software with presentation software. Three major problems are identified: Content layout definition, editing focus linkage, and exporting to speaker notes. This paper will show how our Caption Editing System with Presentation Integration (CESPI) solves these problems. Experiments showed 37.6% improvement in total editing time.

The objective of this research is to investigate the relationship between user’s knowledge of operation procedures for some electric appliances and their cognitive styles. First, questionnaires were given to the participants. The participants answered below questions about cognitive styles. Second, to investigate the participants’ knowledge of operating procedures of the electric appliances, participants were asked to write free text description on how to use an appliance without actually operating it. We found certain kinds of knowledge about operation procedures were linked to user’s cognitive style.

In keeping with a user capability and product demand approach to product assessment, this paper examines the cognitive demands placed on users when interacting with consumer products. The eventual aim is to develop a set of cognitive capability scales that could be used in the analytical evaluation of product interfaces. We explore the dimensions of cognitive capability relevant to product interaction and describe how these may be used to evaluate a given design. Planned work addresses quantitative measurement of cognitive capabilities and predictive validation of capability scales.

Our research indicates that acquisition of phonetic skills in voiced and voiceless speech sounds was improved by using Computer Aided Articulatory Tutor (CAAT). The interface of CAAT displays the place of articulation and relevant image objects for articulatory training simultaneously. The place of articulation was presented by using three dimensional articulatory tutor. Suitable computer graphics and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) techniques were used to develop inner articulatory movements of the animated tutor. Ten hearing impaired children between the ages 4 and 7 were selected and trained for 30 hours across four weeks on 50 words under 10 lessons. The words were selected from the categories of voiced and voiceless stops namely Bilabial, Dental, Alveolar, Retroflex and Velar. The articulatory performance of HI children was investigated to find out their speech intelligibility.

Supportive technology is expected to facilitate life at home for people with cognitive impairment. To study the usability of a number of support-installations in ordinary homes a three-year project was launched in Sweden. Three sites, each planned to comprise some twenty participants about sixty years of age and upwards, suffering either from a cognitive impairment such as an acquired brain injury or other forms of cognitive impairments, have been engaged. One goal was to acquire knowledge and experience about technical support, their appropriateness and adaptability to the users and to the organisation supporting them. Another goal was to develop and test supportive technology and a third goal was to explore ways to the market for Design for All products which are necessary for some but useful to most of tenants. The housing companies played an important role for the development of the project and the way to the market, as many technical aids basically are parts of the physical building structure.

This paper proposed that the viewing conditions for printed matters and projected images are quite different for three major reasons. Therefore, the brightness perception phenomenon and brightness perception theory generated from the printed matters should be revised and modified when applied to the projected images. The purposes of the present research were to examine the effects of brightness illusions while viewing the projected images, to understand the brightness perception process in projection environment, and thus to generate design implications for better usage of the projectors.

Standard QWERTY keyboards are considered as a major source of reluctance towards computer usage by Japanese elderly, because of their limited experience with Western typewriters and the high cognitive demand involved in typing Japanese characters with them. This paper discusses the difficulty in typing Japanese characters using QWERTY keyboards, and then introduces two alternative approaches. The first approach makes use of touchscreen and software keyboards. Touchscreen enables users to enter Japanese characters more directly and is expected to moderate their resistance. As the second approach, a trial to develop a mechanical keyboard that is able to change its key layout dynamically is introduced. The proposed keyboard is also capable to change colors of keys, to flash keys to attract users’ attention, and to hide unnecessary keys to avoid errors.

This paper described an assessment system which embedded expert system based on theidea of neural network. Authors developed a computerized assessment tool for mouse operating proficiency and applied into clinical service. The result indicated that the objective tool had great contribution for selecting suitable pointing device for the client. However, clinical also found that comparing the effectiveness between different device and operation environment by some parameters was labor consuming. Expert system may be an available solution for clinical professional to select suitable pointing and selecting device more efficiently. Therefore, this study aimed to develop an embedding expert system into a computerized assessment tool for mouse operating proficiency.

This paper proposes a listed sign language system that combines written expressions in table form with sign language fragments. The system generates urgent video style messages that offer rapid, certain, and easy understanding for environments such as railway carriages. We developed a prototype of the system and conducted an evaluation experiment. The results show that the system improves the level of understanding urgent messages. Participants confirmed that the messages scored highly in terms of ease of understanding, high accuracy, rapid understanding, and sense of security.

Stroke is the biggest cause of severe disability in the UK. The National Service Framework for Older People recommends that rehabilitation should continue until maximum recovery has been achieved. However, due to cost factors inpatient length of stay is decreasing and outpatient rehabilitation facilities are limited. The level of therapy could be improved by providing assistive technology, in the form of tele-rehabilitation, within patients’ homes. This paper presents the development of the SMART rehabilitation system, a home-based tele-rehabilitation system to argument upper limb rehabilitation, with the emphasis on the implementation of the system ICT platform and user interface design.

Studies using the sensory substitution devices reveal that perceptive activity itself is embodied in a living body capable of movement and possessing its own spatial dimensions. To study the conditions of a prosthetic perception, we developed a minimal device, Tactos, which carries out a coupling between the pen of a graphics tablet and tactile sensory stimulators. This system allows subjects to explore virtual tactile pictures and is intended to give to blind people an access to computer graphics. We will present here experimental results regarding the different aspects of perception using this device.

Within ASK-IT project, an extensive survey of the needs of elderly and disabled travelers using infomobility services has been performed. More specifically, 39 past and on-going research projects have been reviewed, having a common aim to ASK-IT. The user needs that have emerged after the testing of the developed systems are highlighted in this document for the transport and tourism areas. Results do not refer only to the visual and acoustical HMI of systems and services for information provision while traveling, but also to the content and the design aspects of the HMI, in order to satisfy accessibility.

Eighty percent of seniors have some type of functional impairment that impacts one or more activities of daily living. This paper focuses on the use of assistive technology devices to support elders with successful aging. A variety of assistive technology devices and their utilization by elders are explored.

Though the Web and those who use it have changed considerably in the last decade, a digital divide between older and younger users persists. Older users still use the Web less than younger users, and more commonly experience significant usability issues when they do. With the emergence of Web 2.0 technologies, we have the ability to close that divide and ensure the Web is universally usable for people of all ages. It requires taking what we know of “senior surfer” requirements and applying them to Web 2.0 interfaces. This paper examines the changing nature of the Web, the Senior Web user, and assesses how Web 2.0 technologies can – but do not yet - improve universal access for everyone. Pilot studies support these hypotheses; future studies are planned to further examine these issues.

In two studies, we investigated the influences of some individual variables that are related to information search strategies and information access in general for old end-users, and we investigated experimentally the influences of metamemory on their performances and strategies. The first study investigated the Internet access, interests, and information search from the Internet among seniors, by using interviews with a semi-directed questionnaire performed with 47 old end-users (ages from 68 to 73 years). The second study investigated the impacts of a specific cognitive ability, i.e., metamemory abilities, on the information search activities performed by 50 old end-users. Results have shown that the World Wide Web emerged as a major information resource for them, their opinions are modulated by Web experience, locating relevant information among information provided by the search engines emerged as a major problem for the old end-users, and metamemory abilities do not seem to be implicated in the computerized information search activities: No significant result was obtained in the experiment conducted in the second study. Additional research with old end-users is needed to determine the generalisability of the results obtained in our two studies.

The analysis of the potential for technological innovations to contribute to the prolongation of the independence of the elderly in the care context needs to be situated against a background of change which presents a set of challenges, opportunities and risks. The challenge is to ensure an optimal quality of life and equitable treatment for the growing elderly population. Technological innovations present significant opportunities for meeting these challenges. However, there are also some potential risks associated with the application of technology in this domain. Starting from this apprehension, the paper deals with physical environments and needs of elderly in relation to technical implications and ethical considerations. Two pilot projects in the field of “Ambient Assisted Living” are outlined, dealing with the development of an electronic user terminal and a safety assistant for the elderly.

Aging implies a general decrease of physical and mental fitness, which, however, largely depends on training. Additionally, individual impairments occur more frequently with age. Three studies show that most elderly people struggle with the application of modern technologies, although physical communication is only slowed but not impaired and handling characteristics do not significantly differ from younger persons. Most usability problems originate from a lack of understanding the complex interaction of menu control. Former education and missing experience then tend to augment usability problems with time. Using the example of a mobile phone prototype it is shown that, despite the complex and inconsistent needs of elderly, the usability obstacles can be vanquished by considering the hierarchy of cause-effect relationships for design.

We report on a study exploring the use of voice commands by older adults browsing the Web. We sought to develop an understanding of how such commands might make Web navigation and access to Web accessibility transformations easier. The results suggested a number of surprising difficulties in using spoken commands. Some were due to general confusions about how to use the browser. Some were due to mismatches between what was natural to say versus what was natural to do with a mouse. We review some of these difficulties and discuss possible underlying reasons. Finally, we suggest interface changes that would make an otherwise well-engineered user interface better suited for voice commands.

Older adults have difficulties in using unfamiliar IT appliances because they look poor to learn operations in trial-and-error fashion. To find a different way for older adults to learn operations effectively, an experiment like usability testing with Electronic Program Guide (EPG) system on a HDD/DVD recorder was executed. Unfocused general information was not helpful for learning new operations. Repeated practice of basic operations with timely help-guidance messages facilitated the acquisition of targeted elementary actions and made them easy to learn new elementary actions as well as new complicated operations. It was suggested that older adults could learn better from successful operations than from trial-and-errors, which may induce harmful error spiral. It is necessary to investigate how to avoid error spiral in self-learning environment in home use.

Improving the quality of life of elderly people is an emerging issue within our information society for both research and development. This paper addresses some issues on the development of applications for mobile devices, which have been designed to enhance the quality of life of the growing number of elderly people, and how they can be made more acceptable to the target population. We summarize some relevant issues in order to devise a research methodology to cover more than just the technological and physical aspects of user interfacing but also psychological and sociological aspects. One aspect of achieving this aim is to confront designers and developers with those problems that the elderly face daily and which are not easily understood – especially by younger designers and developers. Finally, we present some issues on how to simulate certain physical constraints of elderly by using the AgeSim, which is a simulation suit. However, not only physical but also cognitive impairment cause problems amongst elderly and result in fear, anxiety and consequently in rejection. The main goal of this paper is to raise awareness amongst developers on which problems are to be taken into considerations during design and development of mobile applications for the elderly.

This study investigated the optimal button size and spacing for touch screen user interfaces intended for use by older adults. Current recommendations in the literature are aimed at general audiences and fail to consider the specific needs of older adults. Three independent variables, button size, button spacing, and manual dexterity were studied in two experiments that measured reaction time, accuracy and user preferences. Design recommendations for touch screen button size and spacing for older adults are stated based on these experiments. The paper also discusses the role of manual dexterity in designing appropriate touch screen interfaces for older adults.

Wireless broadband networks for home environment present us with many challenges unfamiliar in more public settings. At home, we encounter the end-users with little ICT experience. Probably among the most challenging members of the home network are the elderly, who may have demanding needs for ensuring accessibility. Either living in a joined community as in a home for the elderly or at home on their own, the possibility to have a remote connection to the homes of their extended family may become important by e.g. decreasing mobility. Interconnectivity between various heterogeneous networks across multiple homes means for example situations where the family shares a photo album or web server with various pieces located at different homes. In this paper, we identify usability challenges presented by internetworking multiple homes, with a special focus on universal accessibility.

As the aged society and digital convergence have been progressed, 6most of elderly users are having difficulties in using mobile phone with complex functions. It is necessary to develop mobile phone with easy and convenient usability for universal users including elderly based on concept of universal design. We conducted qualitative & contextual research on elderly users’ contextual experience and interaction difficulties in using mobile phone in everyday life. Based on elderly users’ need figured out in this research, we tried to retrieve User Interface Design implication for universal design mobile phone, which can be used easily by anyone regardless of age and ability.

In this paper we describe work directed at exploiting existing consumer electronics to present just-in-time reminder cues to assist ageing-in-place. We describe our methodology which first employed a series of structured interviews to gain insight into older people’s opinions and expectations of consumer electronics and of the notion of autonomous and persuasive reminder systems. We then discuss our initial efforts to design and evaluate (using a Wizard-of-Oz methodology) a system which can make use of the existing programmable and wirelessly-networked, technology within the home, to provide a rich messaging service to older people as they conduct their everyday activities. Our research has the long-term aim of providing just-in-time, appropriate cues via multimodal displays to aid safer ageing-in-pace for the older population.

Digital products with small-touch-screens are increasingly affecting daily life, and most especially that of the elderly population in Taiwan which, at present, is over 9.9%. As people age, they find it increasingly difficult to operate digital products with small-touch-screens. The main purpose of this study was to investigate and categorize these difficulties for three groups of adult users. The fifteen participants in the investigation were classified into three groups: young adults, middle-aged adults and elderly adults. All of the adults were requested to accomplish different tasks using three digital products with small-touch-screens and then to provide their opinions on the kinds of difficulties they had encountered. The experts classifying the results found that the elderly adults were the group confronted with the most difficulties in the operation of small-touch-screen digital devices. In the digital dictionary experiment, the greatest difficulty for the three groups centered on cognitive ability; the majority of problems were related to motion in the PDA. In fact, the most notable problems for each of the participants were related primarily to motion in the PDA and to cognition. The results also indicated the common operational problems with the three digital products with small-touch-screens, including the impact of space or position of handwriting and button size on motion ability; and the impact of the size and color of the fonts or icons and screen brightness on perception ability. Lastly, regarding the difficulties with cognition, most of the participants were confronted with complex information, inconsistent with the interfaces of the digital products. Results of this study were based on the opinions from the three adult groups and, could be used in future designs for small-touch-screen interfaces.

It is important that the operation characteristic of the elderly have to clear for designing information equipment that was deeply considered about influences of aging. Visual search tasks were imposed on the elderly in this study and found strategy for searching target by analyzing their eye movements that gazing time, gazing position and locus in the search task. Experimental parameters of stimulus were the number of character strings, the letter types, and the number of stimulus represented on screen. Results showed that mean gazing times become long in accordance with the number of characters. When alphabetic letters was reproduced on screen, the elderly hesitated to search a target stimulus. By analysis of gazing position and locus of eye movement, the strategy of visual search of the elderly was categorized three patterns.

Older people provide much greater challenges to user-centred design than more traditional user groups. It is also very important to encourage (often young) designers to develop a relationship with, and an empathy for, older users. It is recommended that older users be fully integrated into the design process. Researchers, however, need to take care to be sensitive to the characteristics, sensory and cognitive capabilities, and the attitudes of older people to computers and to being included in research studies. The paper suggests strategies for doing this, together with the more radical approach of using professional actors as surrogates for real older users.

Elderly adults face two serious challenges bridging the digital divide. First, many suffer from physical or cognitive disabilities, which inhibit computer use. Second, the “traditional” personal computer interface constitutes a foreign and forbidding paradigm. Consequently, elderly adults are less likely to access the Internet, and this lack of accessibility denies them increased social contact and access to information. This paper presents the design of a tangible user interface (TUI) for an email client that is suited to the physical, neurological, and cognitive needs of elderly users. A review of the TUI literature identifies radio frequency identification (RFID) tagged cards, integrated with standard personal computers, as a viable alternative to the mouse. These cards can represent interaction objects and actions, forming the basis for an interaction language. The email client interaction design illustrates many simple and advanced RFID card interaction techniques.

This paper reports on a study comparing Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 and Mozilla Firefox 2 with 18 participants aged 60 years old and over. The participants performed six groups of tasks related to browsing, navigation, navigation enhancement, bookmark, information transfer, personalization and technical manipulation. The study covers their performance, problems, and comments. This study found that menu bar is an important feature for supporting browsing activity. The participants performed the navigation tasks well but less so for personalization and technical manipulation tasks.

An important issue of the demographic change in the German population is the maintenance and promotion of the employability of aging workforces. However, there are hardly any suitable concepts or usable tools available to realize this goal. Possible approaches should push the individual strengths of the aging workers to the foreground and intercept the possible physical and cognitive losses in ability that occur with an increase in age. A model of age-differentiated adaptation of the human-computer interface, in which automatic adaptations are conducted based on individual user characteristics, is presented in this article. First connections between user characteristics and adaptation dimensions were analyzed in a study with 90 subjects ranging from 20 to 73 years of age. Results indicate a significant influence of graphical layout on memorization as well as interpretation performance.

The increase of a “graying” society is apparent in recent decades and as such, the attention of marketing and product design is more and more focused on older users of technical devices. The study addresses the relevance of hardware and software design in human-computer interaction of older users. It was found that performance significantly increased (up to 3 times) with easier sensumotor transformation and easier task type. However, this was more prominent in middle-aged users than in younger users. Task difficulty revealed a rather unspecific impact on performance (43%), and was equally apparent in both age groups. Recommendations derived from this review show that older users will profit most from touch based or mouse operated interfaces. Additionally, easy icon and menu designs are often missed and will become more and more important for older users.

An eye-tracking study of a prototype website was conducted with 10 younger adults (ages 20-39) and 10 older adults (ages 50-69) to determine if there are differences in how they scan webpages. They performed the same tasks on the website. On the average, the older adults spent 42% more time looking at the content of the pages than did the younger adults. They also spent 51% more time looking at the navigation areas. The pattern of fixations on almost all pages showed that the older adults looked at more parts of the page than did the younger adults. Implications for designing webpages that work well for older adults are provided.

The results of examining a scanning user interface implementation with command inputs in the form of head gestures for a rehabilitation robot using Fitts’ law variations and comparing these with a servo eye tracking model are made. Calculations show that the movement time prediction is more accurate in this case using the servo eye model. The response from the linearised eye model predicts that there is a minimum scanning distance that can be used and minimum spacing between commands display.